Toy Safari Bingo

There are a lot of things I could talk about when I think back to this past weekend’s meetup in London.

I could talk about the ridiculous amount of walking I made everyone do. I could talk about the beautiful sight of springtime in London. I could talk about my love of London’s museums as a place to do toy photography.

But I thought that something a little more humorous from the weekend might be a good way to show how much fun these meetups are, and how much the people who go make the weekend what it is. (And let’s be honest, to encourage you to go to the next one if you can!)

We walked around 35km over the weekend and talked a lot as we walked. And whilst we were talking and walking we came up with the idea of Toy Safari Bingo. We found we were often saying the same things, so we decided that for the next meetup, we would need to bring bingo cards to check off when something was said. Full house wins!

This is the current version, based off of initial Facebook comments by everyone who attended. It’s probably not a final version as these things are never finished, but it gives a great reflection on how the weekend went and the kind of things toy photographers are constantly saying!

How many of these can you check off from your last toy photography session outside?

A few details provide some stories from the weekend:

• ‘Where’s Boris?’ – it turns out that Me2 is really good at getting himself separated from the group. He likes to get that perfect photo, even if we all wander off without him. This led to us standing around saying ‘where’s Boris?’ a lot!
• ‘Are the coffee shops open yet?’ – apparently, 6am is too early for coffee shops near the Tower of London to be open on a Saturday. Something to consider the next time we all get up at the crack of dawn! No photography before coffee is probably a good rule (guideline?) to have!
• ‘Let’s stand in the shadow’ –  I arranged for us to walk along the South Bank. It turns out though that the sun was all on the other side of the river and there was a bitterly cold wind hitting us throughout the early morning walk! So, of course, we kept warm with some good sarcasm about it!
• ‘Help, I’ve lost my minifig!’ – we left the weekend one minifigure down – a guard fell through the gates at Buckingham Palace. Related: ‘Man down! Stefan, please rescue it!’

The point of this post is to share a little bit of fun from the weekend and to say that toy photography meetups are not only about taking photos of toys. The photography is important of course, and it is the reason we get together in the first place, but meetups are so much more than that! They are full of laughter and shenanigans (case in point: we went on a carousel!). They are a place to see friends, old and new, to try things out and to discover a new vantage point by exploring a place with toys and supportive people. It’s a great experience all round really.

I highly recommend you get to one, or, if that’s not possible, consider running your own. This bunch took the chance to come to London to meet up. Will your sigfig be there next time?

– Lizzi
 @stepping_on_bricks
https://steppingonbricks.com/